N00b Question - Pig Spawner

Out exploring, found an abandoned mine and deep inside is what looks like a cage on fire, up in the air, with a pig spinning around in it very fast.

I did a little reading and it looks like I found a "monster spawner" but since the item inside is a pig, it's going to spawn pigs? There seems to be a way to create "grinders" to get XP / items from the spawn (which interests me but this is my first encounter with this item.

you need to protect them, spawners are rare, and they can not be mined, so that makes them rarer, also, xp is the bees knees of minecraft, especially with EMC's new update. And spawners are where you get the most of them.

Out exploring, found an abandoned mine and deep inside is what looks like a cage on fire, up in the air, with a pig spinning around in it very fast.

I did a little reading and it looks like I found a "monster spawner" but since the item inside is a pig, it's going to spawn pigs? There seems to be a way to create "grinders" to get XP / items from the spawn (which interests me but this is my first encounter with this item.

Any tips / advice on what I can do with this?

Thanks.

Monster Spawners Spawn many different mobs, you're most likely to get some cave spiders out of that one.

The 1.2 update looks like they might finally fix SMP spawners so that they display the correct spinning mob.

Most xp grinders utilising spawners have the spawner within a dark room with water flowing over the floor pushing the mobs into a corner. They then use a mob elevator (shaft with alternating water source blocks and signs) to raise the mob up before directed, with more water, to an empty shaft to drop it far enough to almost kill it. Player can then stand at the bottom of he drop and punch mobs for instant kill and xp. I have never used a baby spider spawner so it might need to be tweaked from the standard zombie/skeleton grinders. There will be numerous examples on YouTube to help you.Good luck

Update : It is a cave spider spawn (good call ivonator123) and I watched a few videos on how to create a grinder; good stuff. XP ahoy!

Question: I have read that the spawner generator algorithm is sensitive to light levels and also scans a certain area for a count of generated items when creating a new mob member. (i.e. to prevent overcrowding I guess). I created a pretty big room with water that pushes the spiders into a corner hole (2x2) and out to an area I can kill them. But from the videos I have seen, people go away for a while, come back later (a day or so maybe?) and have dozens even 100s of spiders enclosed. I have found that the spiders will only generate if I am around the room. So if I go away for a while (hours), when I come back and there is nothing collected. When I stay for a little while, they start spawning (about 2 or 3 every 5 minutes). I thought the generation process would be faster or more productive. I feel like I have done something wrong.

Here are some of the guidelines I followed:- The spawn room is completely dark (or very close to 0 light)- The room is 17x17 by about 8 above the spawn point. I don't have much room below the spawn due to lava concerns.- Water flows from a high point in one corner down to the lowest point in the room and out through a hole.

Any advice on what else I might need to do to help "encourage" production? (or is the rate I stated above pretty much normal)